Montville — East Lyme began the 2021 football season as a mystery.

A limited number of Vikings had varsity experience, so they expect to endure some growing pains this fall.

Let's just say coach Rudy Bagos was pleasantly surprised with his team's performance on Friday at Montville.

East Lyme raced to a 27-6 halftime lead on the way to a 41-18 victory over the Indians.

The year off showed for both teams, as the penalties and mistakes piled up.

The Vikings made their share of mistakes, but also capitalized on Montville miscues.

Quarterback Will Anglin threw two touchdown passes to sophomore Aidan Patterson and ran for another score to power the Vikings. Patterson also bolted 36 yards for a score while senior Rowan Mundell added two touchdown runs.

"We had contributions from everybody," Bagos said. "What allows us to do that is the leadership from our seniors. The kids are enjoying it for what it is and are happy to be finally playing some football."

East Lyme controlled the line of scrimmage from the start and wore down Montville.

"It's been typical of small school football," Montville coach Tanner Grove said. "We can play in spurts. But against a school like this, they just run too many guys at us up front. We just didn't answer.

"They played really well when they had to. They had series where they didn't play great. But when they had to have a play to break our backs, they got it."

On the game's opening drive, East Lyme had a touchdown called back because of a penalty. But the Vikings ended up scoring anyway, as Mundell broke free for a 66-yard touchdown run for a 7-0 lead.

"It was a very good bounce back," Bagos said. "That showed the kind of team we are. We are just going to keep battling. We're going to compete and keep plugging away."

Then the two teams traded turnovers.

Montville took advantage of its takeaway, forcing and recovering a fumble at the East Lyme 2-yard line. On fourth down, senior Miles Sarmiento plowed in from the two. But the Indians missed the extra point.

It was all East Lyme until halftime.

Anglin scored on a 16-yard scramble. Then, after Montville fumbled away a fair catch attempt on a punt, Mundell eventually raced 24 yards for a touchdown, increasing the lead to 21-6 early in the second quarter.

When Patterson turned a short pass reception into a 55-yard scoring play by weaving through traffic, the Vikings led 27-6.

Montville dominated possession in the third quarter but could only score once.

Sarmiento found a hole and space outside to go 40 yards for a score, cutting the gap to 27-12 on Montville's second series of the second half.

Then the Indians got the ball back again by forcing Anglin's fumble near midfield.

But the East Lyme defense held its ground, stopping Montville on fourth down and eight from the Viking 15.

The Vikings basically sealed the win when Anglin threw a short pass to Patterson who finished off the 40-yard touchdown play, making it 34-12 with about nine minutes left.

Montviille finished with four turnovers.

"It's been a couple of years, and that was our worry going into week one," Grove said. "We don't have a lineman who's ever played varsity football before. For two years now, we've had to try to get them ready without getting ready.

"We're going to keep working at it. This was a tough matchup for us week one."

g.keefe@theday.com